Opinion and Argument: Two Kinds of Claims

Two friends are arguing about a movie. One says, "That film was boring." The other says, "That film was boring because nothing changed for the main character — she wanted the same thing at the end that she wanted at the beginning, so there was no real story." Both sentences sound like criticism. But only one of them gives you something to push back against. The first is an opinion. The second is an argument.

An opinion is a claim that expresses what someone thinks or feels. It can be sincere, it can be widely shared, it can even be correct. But on its own, it offers no reasons. If you disagree with "that film was boring," the only move available to you is to say "no it wasn't." The conversation stops there, or it turns into a shouting match.

An argument is different. An argument is a claim — called the conclusion — supported by one or more reasons, called premises. The premises are meant to give you grounds for accepting the conclusion. In the movie example, the conclusion is "the film was boring," and the premise is "the main character wanted the same thing at the end that she wanted at the beginning." Now you have something to work with. You can challenge the premise (did the character really not change?). You can challenge the link between the premise and the conclusion (does a static character actually make a film boring — what about films where stillness is the point?). Either way, the disagreement can go somewhere.

Here is the part that trips people up. An argument does not have to be a good argument to count as an argument. A weak argument is still structurally different from a bare opinion, because it has the shape of premise-supporting-conclusion. "Cats are better than dogs because my cat is fluffy" is a bad argument — the premise barely supports the conclusion — but it is an argument. "Cats are better than dogs" by itself is an opinion. The difference is not about quality. It is about whether reasons are on the table.

This matters because public conversation often mixes the two on purpose. A speaker states an opinion in a confident voice and acts as if reasons have been given, when nothing has been offered except the speaker's certainty. Volume, repetition, and confidence are not premises. If you ask yourself, "What reason did they give me?" and the honest answer is "none — they just said it firmly," you are looking at an opinion dressed up as an argument.

The useful habit is to separate the two before you respond. When you hear a claim, ask: is there a "because" here, stated or implied? If yes, find the premise and decide whether it actually supports the conclusion. If no, you have an opinion, and the appropriate response is not to argue against it but to ask for reasons. "Why do you think that?" is one of the most powerful sentences in critical thinking. It turns an opinion into an argument — or reveals that there was never an argument to begin with.